Why are people talking about flying a flag upside-down?
Today, a bunch of people on my Mastodon feed are making declarations about somebody apparently flying a flag upside down, and this apparently has something to do with the New York Times being terrible.
I grew up near Westboro Baptist in Topeka. We all knew where they lived because they fly the US flag upside down. They say “the US is in distress because of all the sinning”. Basically, because they hate LGBT+ people.
I remember seeing both the Moroccan and Paleatinian flags flown upside down at times. Either people simply do not know the correct orientation (remember: star points to the top, green on bottom), don’t really care enough to fix it, or have no idea that it’s being used as an insult (does that only apply to the US flag?)
In general, any flag upside down is an insult to the flag and to whatever that flag symbolizes.
So, for example the Usa flag upside down means insulting the Usa.
People have mentioned a ship flying their own flag upside down. This is special, because they are apparently insulting themselves, like “something is very wrong with us” - this means distress at sea.
In this case, somebody has managed to manipulate the meaning into something different: the Usa flag upside down is now an insult to only one political party.
Don’t fly [the] flag upside down unless there is an emergency.
Though you’re right about the hijacking of the symbolism. Used to be exceedingly rare to see. Nowadays, it’s basically just fascists self-identifying themselves.
The question was “why is everyone talking about flying a flag upside down”.
The answer to the question is that “a quasi-fascist member of the US Supreme Court used it as a dogwhistle to signal support to other fascist elements in the US”. And I provided additional context indicating when it is appropriate to fly an inverted flag in the US, per US flag code.
Don’t complain when someone answers a question in a thorough manner.
So, for example the Usa flag upside down means insulting the Usa.
Gee, I wonder why he was talking about the US in response to this in your comment, and the OP saying it was related to the New York (the one in the US, not old York in the UK) Times. Damn Americans, there are other countries!
In europe, farmers did it to protest european farming laws. The idea was quickly adopted by corona weirdos to forward their ideologies, so it was ultimately seen as something for the mentally unstable, except by the mentally unstable themselves (and some farmers still haven’t gotten the message)
Justice Alito’s house had a flag upside down, while the Supreme Court is considering Trump’s cases. Flying a flag upside down was what insurrectionists did on Jan 6. Insert your own conclusion.
*Apparently the flag was in 2021 the days after Jan 6. I thought it was recently but apparently not.
See, that’s where I was confused. Since it has rotational symmetry, I didn’t notice, since I just took an image and rotated it— but it didn’t consider how a flag hangs from a flagpole, with one edge having eyeholes for a rope or string. This means it would be inverted, not rotated, and the stripes would be different.
In the upper corner of the flag nearest the flagpole, the wider diagonal white stripe should be above the red diagonal stripe. If the red is above the wider white stripe the flag is upside-down.
Violating these laws can lead to varying degrees of fines and or prosecution, depending on the country and the type of country flag desecration (burning a flag is worse than getting the height of the flag on the pole wrong).
Half mast is the more famous distress signal internationally.
That said, Alito, even if not doing something illegal, is definitely signalling something very ominous. I agree with the experts that such an extreme degree of the appearance of impropriety is definitely gonna run afoul of supreme court ethics rules.
But: no check of power means no executive power and that means a rule might as well be unwritten.
Flag code in the US has no teeth. Flag burning is legal per Texas v. Johnson. Symbolizing a stance of the nation being in distressed is definitely protected speech. Impropriety is a stretch for a statement on his private property that amounts to “our country is in turmoil”.
Flying the national maritime ensign upside down is an internationally recognized distress signal. A UK-flagged boat wouldn’t fly the Union Jack upside down (which would be rather ineffective), but rather the Red Ensign (for civilian vessels).
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